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Solution to today’s crossword in the New York Times
Solution to today’s SYNDICATED New York Times crossword in all other publications
CROSSWORD SETTER: Jeff Chen
THEME: Black Cats … the letters CAT are “hiding” in some of the black squares (the four “+” configurations, and the middle three squares) and are used to complete the themed answers:
30A. Offense that’s provoked by lurid news : COPY(CAT) CRIME
43A. Author who wrote about frontier life : WILLA (CAT)HER
63A. Sowed one’s wild oats : TOM(CAT)TED
88A. Base of Asti wine : MUS(CAT) GRAPE
102A. Dominatrix’s wear : LATEX (CAT)SUIT
6D. The Pied Piper of Hamelin, e.g. : RAT-(CAT)CHER
14D. Screwball character on “The Simpsons” : CRAZY (CAT) LADY
58D. Hero’s spot : DELI(CAT)ESSEN
76D. Modern R&R option : STAY(CAT)ION
COMPLETION TIME: 29m 09s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 2 … WILLA (Willi), TESSERAE (tesserie)
Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
1. Break in poetry : CAESURA
In poetry, a caesura is an audible pause that breaks up a line of verse. An example would be (from Alexander Pope): “To err is human; to forgive, divine.”
14. Something media executives keep an eye on? : CBS TV
CBS introduced its “eye” logo in 1951.
19. The hare, notably : ALSO-RAN
“The Tortoise and the Hare” is perhaps the most famous fable attributed to Aesop. The hare takes a nap during a race against the tortoise, and the tortoise sneaks past the finish line for the win while his speedier friend is sleeping.
23. Molecules in natural gas : ETHANES
The main component in natural gas is methane, with the second most voluminous constituent being ethane. Both methane and ethane are combustible, and so traditionally the methane and ethane from natural gas were burned together to generate heat. However, since the sixties, ethane has been used as a valuable starter material for the production of ethylene, itself a raw material for polyethylene and other plastics. So, these days the ethane is extracted at a refinery before the natural gas is bottled as a fuel.
24. Acrobat developer : ADOBE
Adobe Acrobat is the software used to create .pdf files. Most of us are more familiar with the associated application called Adobe Acrobat Reader, because that’s what we use to read those .pdf files.
35. Davis of “I’m Not Rappaport” : OSSIE
Ossie Davis was a very successful African-American actor, but also a director, poet, playwright and social activist.
“I’m Not Rappaport” is a 1996 movie centered on two aging men played by Walter Matthau and Ossie Davis. The phrase “I’m not Rappaport” comes from an old vaudeville routine that the pair run through during the film.
41. New England seafood staple : SCROD
Scrod is the name given to fish that has been “scrawed” i.e. split open, dried and then broiled.
43. Author who wrote about frontier life : WILLA (CAT)HER
American novelist Willa Cather wrote what’s called the “prairie trilogy”, books that tell the story of Swedish immigrants living in Nebraska. The titles in the trilogy are “O, Pioneers!”, “The Song of the Lark” and “My Antonia”. Cather won the Pulitzer Prize for another novel, “One of Ours”, that is set in Nebraska and the French battlefields of WWI.
51. Cold war fighters : MIGS
The Russian fighter jets that we know as “MiGs” are so called because they were designed by the Mikoyan-and-Gurevich Design Bureau, and MiG is an acronym for “Mikoyan-and-Gurevich” in Russian.
52. Shred : IOTA
Iota is the ninth letter in the Greek alphabet. We use the word “iota” to portray something very small as it is the smallest of all Greek letters.
55. Winged : ALATE
Something that is “alate” has winglike extensions (as in a leaf perhaps) or is actually winged, like a bird.
60. Diamond unit : CARAT
A carat is a unit of mass used in measuring gemstones and is equal to 200 mg.
70. Metals giant in the Dow Jones industrial average : ALCOA
The Aluminum Corporation of America (ALCOA) is the largest producer of aluminum in the United States. The company was founded in 1888 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where its headquarters are to this day.
72. Monterrey cheddar? : PESO
“Cheddar” is a slang term for “money”.
Monterrey is a Mexican city, the capital of the state of Nuevo Leon in the northeast of the country. Monterrey is the second largest city in Mexico in terms of area, but third largest in terms of population (the largest area city in the country is Mexico City, and the most populous are Mexico City and Guadalajara).
83. ___ mater : ALMA
The literal translation for the Latin term “alma mater” is “nourishing mother”. “Alma mater” was used in Ancient Rome to refer to mother goddesses, and in Medieval Christianity the term was used to refer to the Virgin Mary. Nowadays, one’s alma mater is the school one attended, either high school or college, usually one’s last place of education.
84. Paparazzi payer : TABLOID
The title of the celebrated 1960 Federico Fellini film “La Dolce Vita” translates from Italian as “The Good Life”. There is a character in the film called Paparazzo who is a news photographer. It is this character who gives us our word “Paparazzi”, a term used for photographers who make careers out of taking candid shots of celebrities.
86. Biblical resting spot : MT ARARAT
Mount Ararat is in Turkey. Ararat is a snow-capped dormant volcano with two peaks. The higher of the two, Greater Ararat, is the tallest peak in the country. Ararat takes its name from a legendary Armenian hero called Ara the Beautiful (or Ara the Handsome). According to the Book of Genesis, Noah’s ark landed on Mount Ararat.
88. Base of Asti wine : MUS(CAT) GRAPE
The muscat grape is used to make wine, and is also grown for raisins and table grapes. Muscat is used a lot in Chilean table wines, and relatively rarely in Italian or Californian table wines. However, muscat is used extensively in fortified wines in all wine-growing regions of the world. The sweet dessert wine made from muscat in Spain is called muscatel.
Asti is in the Piedmont region of northwest Italy. The region is perhaps most famous for its Asti Spumante sparkling white wine.
94. Where the Mets once met : SHEA
Shea Stadium in Flushing Meadows, New York was named after William A. Shea, the man credited with bringing National League baseball back to the city in the form of the New York Mets. Shea Stadium was dismantled (not imploded) in 2008-2009, and the site now provides additional parking for the new stadium nearby called Citi Field.
106. ___ Sea, body of water north of Norway : BARENTS
In his native Dutch, the explorer William Barents was known as Willem Barentsz. Barents made three main voyages of exploration in his lifetime, all of them searching for the Northeast Passage, the route from the Atlantic into the Pacific along the Arctic coast. Barents was not successful in finding the route, but made notable discoveries including Bear Island and Spitzbergen. What is now called the Barents Sea is part of the Arctic Ocean north of Norway and Russia.
118. He wrote “One Step Forward, Two Steps Back” : LENIN
“One Step Forward, Two Steps Back – The Crisis in Our Party” is a book first published in 1904 that was written by Vladimir Lenin. It examines the circumstances leading up to the political split in the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, which brought the Bolsheviks (translating as “the majority”) to prominence.
119. Dramatist Sean : O’CASEY
Seán O’Casey was an Irish playwright noted for his works exploring the plight of the working class in Dublin. O’Casey’s most famous works are “Juno and the Paycock” and “The Plough and the Stars”.
Down
1. It may be spotted in a pet store : CALICO
Domestic cats with a white coat and patches of brown and black are called calico cats in this country. In Ireland, and the rest of the world I think, such cats are called tortoiseshell-and-white. “Calico” is not a breed of cat, simply a coloring.
4. Wife of Woody : SOON-YI
Soon-Yi Previn is the adopted daughter of actress Mia Farrow and pianist/conductor André Previn. After Farrow and Previn divorced, Farrow started seeing famed movie director Woody Allen. That relationship ended when Farrow discovered that Allen was having an affair with her daughter Soon-Yi. Woody Allen and Soon-Yi Previn were married in 1997.
6. The Pied Piper of Hamelin, e.g. : RAT-(CAT)CHER
The legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin dates back to medieval times. Recently there have been suggestions that the story is rooted in some truth and that the town of Hamelin did in fact lose many of its children, perhaps to plague. The suggestion is that the tale is an allegory.
8. “Misty” crooner : MATHIS
Johnny Mathis had to face a tough choice in 1956. Mathis was a talented high jumper in college and was invited to try out for the US Olympic team destined for the Melbourne Games. At the same time he was scheduled to make his first recordings, in New York. Mathis opted to go to the Big Apple.
“Misty” was written in 1954 by one Erroll Garner. Johnny Mathis had a hit with “Misty” five years later, and it was to become his signature tune. The song of course features prominently in the 1971 Clint Eastwood thriller “Play Misty for Me”.
9. Leigh Hunt poem “Abou Ben ___” : ADHEM
Abou Ben Adhem, also known as Ibrahim Bin Adham, was an Arab Muslim saint. He was made famous in the western world with the publication in 1838 of the poem “Abou Ben Adhem” that was composed by the English poet James Henry Leigh Hunt.
13. Mosaic tiles : TESSERAE
A tessera is an individual tile used in making a mosaic.
18. Victorian leader? : VEE
V (vee) is the first letter of “Victorian”.
27. Ink holders : OCTOPI
Octopuses and squid have the ability to release a dark pigment into the water as a means of escape. The dark pigment is called cephalopod ink (the squid and octopus belong to the class cephalopod). The dark color is created by melanin, the same substance that acts as a pigment in human skin.
29. Return address letters? : IRS
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) was set up during the Civil War to raise money to cover war expenses. Prior to the introduction of income tax in 1862, the government was funded by levies on trade and property.
32. Bonding measurement : VALENCE
An atom’s valence is the number of electrons that it loses, adds or shares when bonding with other atoms.
33. Feudal vassal : LIEGE
A liege was a feudal lord, one to whom service or allegiance was owed under feudal law. “Liege” was also the term used for one who owed allegiance or service to a lord. Very confusing …
34. P.M.’s and such: Abbr. : LDRS
Prime Ministers (PMs) and such are leaders (ldrs.).
39. Actress Sommer : ELKE
Elke Sommer is a German-born actress who was at the height of her success on the silver screen in the sixties. Sommer won a Golden Globe as Most Promising Newcomer Actress for her role opposite Paul Newman in 1964’s “The Prize”. She also sings and has released several albums. Now Sommer focuses on painting, producing artwork that is strongly influenced by the work of Marc Chagall.
47. Yours, in Ypres : A TOI
Ypres is a Belgian city located close to the French border. In WWI, Ypres was the scene of three devastating battles that resulted in almost a million casualties, including many who suffered in gas attacks.
49. Hwy. that ends near La Guardia : BQE
The Brooklyn-Queens Expressway (BQE) is part of Interstate 278.
Fiorello La Guardia was the Mayor of New York from 1934 to 1945, racking up three full terms in office. The famous airport that bears La Guardia’s name was built at his urging, stemming from an incident that took place while he was in office. He was taking a TWA flight to “New York” and was outraged when the plane landed at Newark Airport, in the state of New Jersey. The Mayor demanded that the flight take off again and land at a small airport in Brooklyn. A gaggle of press reporters joined him on the short hop and he gave them a story, urging New Yorkers to support the construction of a new commercial airport within the city’s limits. The new airport, in Queens, opened in 1939 as New York Municipal, often called “LaGuardia” as a nickname. The airport was officially relabeled as “LaGuardia” in 1947.
51. Precocious Roald Dahl heroine : MATILDA
“Matilda” is a children’s novel by Welsh author Roald Dahl. Hero of the piece is an extraordinary little girl called Matilda Wormwood.
Roald Dahl’s name is Norwegian. Dahl’s parents were from Norway, although Dahl himself was Welsh. Dahl became one of the most successful authors of the twentieth century. Two of his most famous titles are “James and the Giant Peach” and “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”.
54. Apollo 10’s Snoopy, e.g., for short : LEM
In the Apollo program, the Lunar Excursion Module (LEM) was the vehicle that actually landed on the moon and returned the astronauts to the command module that was orbiting overhead. The third LEM built was named “Spider”, and it participated in the Apollo 9 mission which tested the functionality of the LEM design in space. The fourth LEM was called “Snoopy” and it flew around the moon in the Apollo 10 mission, the dress rehearsal for the upcoming moon landing. Apollo 11’s LEM was of course called “Eagle” and it brought Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to and from the moon’s surface.
58. Hero’s spot : DELI(CAT)ESSEN
The word “delicatessen” (or “deli” for short) came into English from the German “Delikatessen”. The Germans borrowed the word from French, in which language “délicatesse” means “delicious things (to eat)”. The term’s ultimate root is “delicatus”, the Latin for “giving pleasure, delightful”.
“Hero” is another name for a submarine sandwich. The hero originated in New York City in the 1800s among Italian immigrants who wanted an Italian sandwich that reminded them of home. The name “hero” was coined in the 1930s, supposedly by a food critic in the “New York Herald Tribune” when he wrote that “one had to be a hero” to finish the gigantic sandwich. Hero is a prevalent term to this day in New York City, reserved for a submarine sandwich with an Italian flavor.
61. Magazine of the National Space Society : AD ASTRA
“Ad Astra” translates from Latin as “To the Stars”, as in the title of the magazine published by the National Space Society, and as in the motto of my alma mater, University College Dublin …
65. Raptors’ home: Abbr. : TOR
The Raptors are the NBA basketball team based in Toronto, Ontario.
67. Pioneering conservationist : MUIR
John Muir was a famous American naturalist, although he was born in Scotland. Muir published “My First Summer in the Sierra” in 1911, describing one of his favorite places in the country, the Sierra Nevada range in California. He was co-founder of the Sierra Club.
68. Watson of the Harry Potter films : EMMA
Emma Watson is the English actress famous for playing Hermione Granger in the “Harry Potter” series of movies. Watson continued her education while pursuing her acting career and studied at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island.
69. Part of T.A.: Abbr. : ASST
A T.A. is a professor’s Teaching Assistant.
73. Lake connected to Sandusky Bay : ERIE
Lake Erie is the fourth largest of the five Great Lakes (Lake Ontario is the smallest). The lake takes its name from the Erie tribe of Native Americans that used to live along its southern shore. Erie is the shallowest of the Great Lakes, something for which nearby residents must be quite grateful. Being relatively shallow, Erie freezes over part way through most winters putting an early end to the lake effect snow that falls in the snow belt extending from the lake’s edge.
80. Jack of old westerns : ELAM
Jack Elam was a movie actor noted for playing the bad guy in Westerns. When Elam was a boy scout, he was accidentally stabbed in the eye with a pencil. The incident left him blind in that eye, and the iris remained skewed to the outside of his face. This gave him a crazed, wide-eyed look that helped add a sense of menace to the characters Elam played.
83. Double agent Aldrich : AMES
Aldrich Ames worked for the CIA until he was convicted in 1994 of spying for the Soviet Union. Prior to identifying Ames as a spy, the CIA was highly concerned at the high rate of disappearance of their own agents behind the Iron Curtain and they struggled for years to find the mole that they assumed must be working within their own ranks. After he was finally arrested, the CIA was criticized for not having identified Ames sooner, particularly as he was living an extravagant lifestyle relative to his apparent means. Ames is serving a life sentence in the US Penitentiary in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
90. Master of literary twists : O. HENRY
O. Henry was the pen name of writer William Sydney Porter from Greensboro, North Carolina. O. Henry is famous for his witty short stories that have a clever twist in the tail.
92. Sautéed seafood dish : SCAMPI
The Italian dish known as “scampi” is a serving of shrimp in garlic butter and dry white wine.
93. Intl. standard : GMT
Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) is the time at the Prime Meridian, the meridian that runs through Greenwich in London.
A meridian is a line of longitude, and the Prime Meridian is that line of longitude defined as 0 degrees. The Prime Meridian is also called the Greenwich Meridian as it passes through the Royal Observatory in Greenwich in southeast London. Of course the line of longitude that is used to represent 0 degrees is an arbitrary decision. 25 nations formally decided in 1884 to use the Greenwich Meridian as 0 degrees as it was already a popular choice. That is all except the French, who abstained from the vote and used the Paris Meridian as 0 degrees on French charts for several decades.
97. Kind of pass for an overseas passenger : EURAIL
In my days as a student, the way to backpack around Europe was using a Europass. Nowadays that is known as a Eurail pass. The Eurail pass gives you access to most trains (and some shipping lines) right across the continent.
106. When doubled, island near Tahiti : BORA
Bora Bora is one of the Society Islands of French Polynesia. The name Bora Bora is imitative of the Tahitian name for the island and should really be pronounced “pora pora”. “Bora bora” translates as “first born”.
107. Author’s encl. : SASE
One type of enclosure (enc.) in a letter might be a self-addressed stamped envelope (SASE).
109. “The Producers” producer Brooks : MEL
Mel Brooks’ real name is Melvin Kaminsky. Brooks is one of very few entertainers (there are only ten) who has won the “Showbiz Award Grand Slam” i.e. an Oscar, Tony, Grammy and Emmy. He is in good company, as the list also includes the likes of Richard Rogers, Sir John Gielgud, Marvin Hamlisch and Audrey Hepburn.
“The Producers” is a 1968 satirical movie written and directed by Mel Brooks, the first film he ever directed. Brooks adapted the movie into a hugely successful Broadway musical that won a record 12 Tony Awards. The original leads in the stage show, Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick, then appeared in a 2005 movie adaptation of the musical version of the original film. Movie to stage show to movie!
110. It may be represented by “XXX” in the funnies : ALE
In a comic strip, a bottle of beer often has a label marked “XXX”.
112. One of the X’s in XXX : TIC
When I was growing up in Ireland we played “noughts and crosses” … our name for tic-tac-toe.
For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Break in poetry : CAESURA
8. Costumed animal, perhaps : MASCOT
14. Something media executives keep an eye on? : CBS TV
19. The hare, notably : ALSO-RAN
20. One on the verge of croaking? : TADPOLE
21. Prompt again : RE-CUE
22. Allowed aboard : LET ONTO
23. Molecules in natural gas : ETHANES
24. Acrobat developer : ADOBE
25. Chains : IRONS
26. “Take that!” : SO THERE!
28. Egg-sorting device : SIZER
30. Offense that’s provoked by lurid news : COPY(CAT) CRIME
32. “Fine, have it your way!” : VERY WELL!
35. Davis of “I’m Not Rappaport” : OSSIE
37. Mom-and-pop orgs. : PTAS
38. Salty stream : TEARS
40. Aforementioned : SAID
41. New England seafood staple : SCROD
43. Author who wrote about frontier life : WILLA (CAT)HER
45. Vehicle that’s out of this world? : STARSHIP
49. Person on tap? : BARKEEP
51. Cold war fighters : MIGS
52. Shred : IOTA
53. Villain in many a fairy tale : EVIL QUEEN
55. Winged : ALATE
57. Salon request : BLOW DRY
59. 27-Down predators : EELS
60. Diamond unit : CARAT
62. Water park feature : SLIDE
63. Sowed one’s wild oats : TOM(CAT)TED
66. ___-dozen : DIME-A
70. Metals giant in the Dow Jones industrial average : ALCOA
72. Monterrey cheddar? : PESO
75. Sanitariums : ASYLUMS
77. Chaise scene? : PATIO
79. Villain in many an action movie : TERRORIST
82. Darkens : DIMS
83. ___ mater : ALMA
84. Paparazzi payer : TABLOID
86. Biblical resting spot : MT ARARAT
88. Base of Asti wine : MUS(CAT) GRAPE
90. Sandwich spec : ON RYE
91. First responders, for short : EMTS
93. Pop’s pop : GRAMP
94. Where the Mets once met : SHEA
95. Back-to-back competitions? : DUELS
100. ETs : SPACEMEN
102. Dominatrix’s wear : LATEX (CAT)SUIT
105. Sampling : TASTE
106. ___ Sea, body of water north of Norway : BARENTS
108. In itself : PER SE
109. Really hurts : MAIMS
111. More poker-faced : STONIER
113. Show time : AIRDATE
115. Act impulsively, as young lovers : ELOPE
116. Without any oomph : TIREDLY
117. More dirty, as Santa’s boots : SOOTIER
118. He wrote “One Step Forward, Two Steps Back” : LENIN
119. Dramatist Sean : O’CASEY
120. Swaddles : ENFOLDS
Down
1. It may be spotted in a pet store : CALICO
2. Last Oldsmobiles : ALEROS
3. Hinders : ESTOPS
4. Wife of Woody : SOON-YI
5. Fancy flower holders : URNS
6. The Pied Piper of Hamelin, e.g. : RAT-(CAT)CHER
7. Years abroad : ANOS
8. “Misty” crooner : MATHIS
9. Leigh Hunt poem “Abou Ben ___” : ADHEM
10. Middle weights? : SPARE TIRES
11. Traffic director : CONE
12. Cry with an accent : OLE
13. Mosaic tiles : TESSERAE
14. Screwball character on “The Simpsons” : CRAZY (CAT) LADY
15. Moistens, in a way : BEDEWS
16. Make the Billboard charts, say : SCORE A HIT
17. Unwieldy boat : TUB
18. Victorian leader? : VEE
20. Foursome : TETRAD
27. Ink holders : OCTOPI
29. Return address letters? : IRS
32. Bonding measurement : VALENCE
33. Feudal vassal : LIEGE
34. P.M.’s and such: Abbr. : LDRS
36. Sigmoid curve : ESS
37. In on : PRIVY TO
39. Actress Sommer : ELKE
43. Cry like a feline : WAUL
45. Participants in some rivalries, briefly : SIBS
46. Going rate? : TOLL
47. Yours, in Ypres : A TOI
48. Number-cruncher’s numbers : RAW DATA
49. Hwy. that ends near La Guardia : BQE
50. Word often seen before 3, 4 or 5, but never 1 : PAR
51. Precocious Roald Dahl heroine : MATILDA
54. Apollo 10’s Snoopy, e.g., for short : LEM
58. Hero’s spot : DELI(CAT)ESSEN
61. Magazine of the National Space Society : AD ASTRA
64. High-fiber cereal : OAT BRAN
65. Raptors’ home: Abbr. : TOR
67. Pioneering conservationist : MUIR
68. Watson of the Harry Potter films : EMMA
69. Part of T.A.: Abbr. : ASST
71. Retirement spot : COT
72. Old barnstorming needs : PROP PLANES
73. Lake connected to Sandusky Bay : ERIE
74. Roll around in the yard? : SOD
76. Modern R&R option : STAY(CAT)ION
77. Well-rounded : PLUMP
78. Source of talk, often : AM STATION
80. Jack of old westerns : ELAM
81. “My turn” : I’M NEXT
83. Double agent Aldrich : AMES
85. Shakes on : AGREES TO
87. Cherry, e.g. : RED
90. Master of literary twists : O. HENRY
92. Sautéed seafood dish : SCAMPI
93. Intl. standard : GMT
94. Intense, as a gaze : STEELY
96. Not fazed by : USED TO
97. Kind of pass for an overseas passenger : EURAIL
98. On the stock exchange : LISTED
99. Stock units? : STEERS
103. Hitch ___ : A RIDE
106. When doubled, island near Tahiti : BORA
107. Author’s encl. : SASE
108. Univ. figure : PROF
109. “The Producers” producer Brooks : MEL
110. It may be represented by “XXX” in the funnies : ALE
112. One of the X’s in XXX : TIC
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